Harry Redknapp has admitted Tottenham would be deluding themselves to believe good football alone would persuade top stars to commit to White Hart Lane.
Spurs are starting to realise their potential under Redknapp, having put themselves in the title race thanks to quality of the likes of Scott Parker, Gareth Bale, Luka Modric and Rafael van der Vaart.
Another player to have put Spurs in the mix is Emmanuel Adebayor, but the forward's future is in doubt as he is currently on loan from Manchester City.
Redknapp wants to keep Adebayor but claims the club cannot match his current wages. The Spurs boss has called on the forward to take a salary cut but has admitted they cannot pay peanuts if they want to challenge for top honours.
"I'd be talking rubbish if I said people wanted to stay at Tottenham because we play good football," Redknapp said. "If you want to keep the best players, we must find a way of doing a deal that's near to what they can earn elsewhere.
"We're not in a position to pay £40million or £200k-a-week, we don't do it. The chairman Daniel Levy doesn't run it like that and rightly so."
